(NCES) GrimDark 40K: What is this, I don't even-

[kongming]

Well, everyone here loves Warhammer 40,000 (it's mandated by law). There are a few games going, even.

I would like to run one with a somewhat different focus, however. Now, I love the Emperor as much as the next person, and I even collect Battle Sisters and possess a reasonable amount of pornography dedicated to them oh hey look, a distraction!, but anyway, time for a different focus group:

Tyranids

Oh yes. But naturally, they'll get a bit of anthropomorphising (you will win Scrabble with that word, I guarantee it). So they can think independently and have their own personalities and so forth. For the sake of sexual content, we'll even have them look a bit more human, but still somewhat monstrous.

Like some of these show when the (NSFW) site works: http://rule34.paheal.net/post/list/Tyranid/1
(Get used to Mister Refresh)

So, obviously this leads to a few questions:

1. What kind of focus are we looking at?
A group of Genestealers (and jeanstealers and genestealer-human hybrids, as well as a Broodlord) and lictors, in the early phases of ruining a planet from within and corrupting the populace? Elements: infiltration, seduction/rape, taking security down, influencing politics and going beneath the notice of the Ordo Xenos.
Or maybe larger critters (Carnifexes, Hive Tyrants, all the way up to Harridans, Dominatrices and Trygons), enjoying life in the hive fleets with other tyranids then going onto planets to ruin stuff and set things up for the final phase, and maybe even capturing space hulks (the giant ships) and searching for survivors to eat/kill/corrupt/rape and setting up civilisations.
It could even be something else, like a mix of whatever things escaping from a research facility, or on a war-torn planet, trying to connect back with the main hive and re-establish control.

2. System or not?
Combat always gets difficult when there is no system. On the flipside, most systems get in the way of character interaction and puzzles and things. I can see reasons both for and against one, so this would be something for players to decide. Now, that being said, if we do use one, we then have the question of "which one?" Dark Heresy could, in theory, work as the basic chassis, but there would be a lot of changes for this. Alternatively, something based on SLA Industries (a very simple one - roll 2d10 and add your skill to an action. -4 if you're untrained. 11+ succeeds. Rolling a pair makes a success a critical success, and a failure a fuck-up) or Shadowrun (lots of d6, not hard to use) or even a d20 type thing.

No matter what was used, homebrew would be involved.

But at any rate, the very first thing: is there interest? Would anyone else actually enjoy this sort of thing? If so, please let me know, and give your opinions on the above.

[sciurindae]

I may be interested, especially if a variant of genestealer is created for the game that directly transforms those it infects rather than having the infection pass onto the children ^^

For system, well there's always GURPS or FATE :)

[Creeper]

What's this? Horrible monsters that take over planets via rape/impregnation?

How did I miss this?

(Interested!)

For system sla could work.

[kongming]

Ooh, excellent, two people interested so far :3

I don't have experience with GURPS or FATE, so I'm ruling them out on the grounds of not wanting to take the time to learn them then adapt them. But I could happily alter the genestealers to transform those it infects. And while my preference is for monster girls, you can feel free to play males if you want and seek out female victims.

So, if this were to be using SLA, it'd basically be:
Species: This affects basic size, stat maximums, gives some free skill ranks, and determines what bio-weapons and symbiotes could be taken
Stats: Strength, Agility, Physique (average of Str and Agi), Intelligence, Alertness, Knowledge (average of Int and Ale).
Wounds would be equal to Physique plus Strength
A bunch of skills can then be chosen (fitting the game, not taken from SLA), and the rest would fall under advantages - mostly mutations and bio-weapons, but also psychic powers (developed like skills) and side-benefits (such as "having access to a hive upon landing").

Alternatively, DH would basically substitute your species/genetic strain for both "homeworld" and "career path". For instance, a genestealer might be:
WS 2d10+40 BS 2d10+10 S 2d10+30 T 2d10+30 Agi 2d10+35 Int 2d10+15 Per 2d10+25 WP 2d10+20 Fel 2d10+20
Can climb just as if it were walking, can infect humans etc. with sexual contact, telepathy
Skills: Stealth, Dodge, Awareness, Swim, Climb, Acrobatics
Talents: Ambidextrous, Genetic Theft
Mutations: Carapace (Head 2 Body 4 Arms 3 Legs 3), Rending Claws (1d10+2 + Strength bonus, ignores all armour, +5 Critical damage), Scything Talons (+1 attack when making an all-out attack in HtH)
-Can later take many unarmed/melee combat Talents, all kinds of skills, talents based on things it infects, and mutations such as acid spit, toxin sacs, implant attacks, flesh hooks, adrenaline glands and extended carapace.

Likewise a d20 thing would replace both Race AND Class with your creature type.

[sciurindae]

Maybe the transformation could be a random and/or rare occurrence, or requires a special parasite/symbiont that the Patriarch(Matriarch? ^^) has a limited number of?

To prevent a complete overrunning nearly zombie-like game :P

Would like to start out as a male human, but would be fine with being turned into a herm or female by the infection :)

Fate is fairly simple.  It's more a descriptive game, it can result in a game that feels more like it's 'system-less'.  It's ment to be easy to learn and use so that it doesn't get in the way of character interaction and puzzles and things.  Basically you just come up with 10 or so descriptors (usually adjectives) for you character, and then pick out which skills your character is great, good, average with or etc. Even has an SRD/OGL at http://www.faterpg.com/dl/


I'm unfamiliar with SLA but have and am familiar with it Dark Heresy.

Also/although there's a variant on Dark Heresy that I think I saw somewhere, where they replaced 'Ballistics' with 'Dexterity' for hand-eye coordination type things.  and for Weapon Skill they used an average. basically (ST+Dex+AG)/3.  And some skills or skill usages would rely upon averaged abilities, such as using Medicae to perform surgery would be (Dex+Int)/2.  And Shadowing would be (AG+Fel)/2 agility to move stealthily, fellowship to make it seem that you're not really following the target and blend in with the crowd.  So on and so forth where need or desired.

[Creeper]

I just wanna be a genestealer.

I don't have DH, so somebody would have to handle stat stuff for me if we went along those lines.

[Silk]

 I assume when you mean humanoid tyranid anthro's, you mean stuff along the lines of Starcrafts Sarah Kerrigan?

[kongming]

Yeah, that's pretty much what I had in mind.

[kongming]

Okay, sorry for the delay, I have classes and stuff.

Anyway, yes, Kerrigan is along the lines of what I was thinking, although they could be even more human (for half-genestealers - humans with extra arms and maybe some blades, looking like something from Witchblade) or more monstrous for some cases (spiny shells, being very large, tentacle faces, whatever).

Okay, for system, let's do something homebrew that's not too hard. It's similar to Shadowrun.
So your dice pool for any given task is Attribute + Skill + possible bonus. You roll that many d6, every 5 or 6 is a "hit". Any task will have a threshold. If you get as many hits as the threshold, you succeed. Otherwise you fail. If you roll more hits, then every excess hit is a "net hit" which can make your results better and better. You can choose to buy hits: trade 4 dice out, get 1 hit. You can trade 8 out for 2, 12 for 3 and so on.

Character Creation:

You have 500 points to spend.

Your attributes are:
Strength, Agility, Logic, Intuition, Charisma, Willpower

They all start at 1, and it costs 10 points to increase one. You may only spend up to 250 points in total on these. A human average is 2-3. but you seriously have no upper limit. So if you want to have an Agility of 26 then I won't stop you.

You also have a pool of Synapse. This starts at 1, and every morning it refills to the amount purchased to. You can spend 10 points to increase it by 1. You can spend a point of Synapse to reroll all failed dice in one roll, to force an opponent to reroll all of their hits on one roll or to activate certain powers.

Health: you have ten boxes of health. Nothing can change this. You soak damage with your Strength plus armour/mutations, so consider this fact. When hit by an attack, they will deal certain amounts of damage to you. Your armour and carapace values are directly subtracted from this. Roll Strength, and every hit is also subtracted. If there is damage left over, you take that many stages of damage:

Stage 1: 1 health box (and a -1 penalty to your attacking dicepools)
Stage 2: 2 health boxes, total 3 (and a -2 penalty to your attacking dicepools)
Stage 3: 3 health boxes, total 6 (and a -3 penalty to your attacking dicepools)
Stage 4: 4 health boxes, total 10 (and knocked out)
Stage 5: 5 health boxes, total 15 (and dead)

So if the damage exceeds your Soak by 2, you take 3 health boxes. If you then get hit for another 1 damage after Soak, this doesn't take another 3 health boxes to raise you to Stage 3, it just deals one level, so you're at Stage 2, on the way to 3.

Skills:
These all start at zero, have no maximum, and cost 3 points to increase

Strength skills: Assault (hand to hand combat) Athletics, Endurance (for poisons, disease, temperature etc)

Agility skills: Firearms (including bio-weapons and symbiotes), Larceny (lock-picking, escaping bonds), Stealth

Intuition skills: Empathy (sensing how things feel), Perception, Warp Sense

Logic skills: Logistics (planning, scrounging, getting enough food in the right places), Medicine (also helps producing toxins), Technology (must pick a specific field)

Charisma skills: Deception, Camaraderie (boosting allies' morale), Persuasion

Willpower skills: Intimidate, Morale, Survival

---

Perks cost 5 points each, and you'll probably have a lot of these. They will cover just about everything. If marked with an asterisk, you can take it multiple times.

-Carapace (gain +1 to your armour value)*
-Claws (your unarmed attacks deal Strength+1 damage and cause Bleeding 1)
-Talons (if you get at least 4 net hits to attack in HtH, you gain a bonus successful attack)*
-Rending (your unarmed attacks ignore armour)
-Wings (you can fly short distances)
-Scything Tail (you can make a single unarmed attack against all foes in HtH combat)
-Crushing Pincers (when grabbing a foe, you deal +3 damage)
-Bonesword (this cannot be disarmed, and is Strength+2)
-Spinebanks (foes who charge you take a Damage 5 hit, you deal +1 Damage when charging)
-Flesh Hooks (gain +3 dice to climb, foes who grab you take a Damage 3 hit)
-Genetic Tendril (you may spend a Synapse to infect someone in HtH if you grab them)
-Tentacles (gain +3 dice to grab foes, their attacks suffer a -1 penalty)*
-Leaping Biomorph (add 5m to your movement rate)*

More on the next post.

[kongming]

Continued:

-Bio Acid (you may spend a primary action to cough acid over someone within 3m. This forces them to roll their Armour rating for soaking, for one full round)
-Bio Plasma (weapon: 3m range, Damage 7, you must roll at least 4 dice as "not a 1" to hit, otherwise you take one automatic box of damage)
-Spinefists (weapon: 5m range, Damage 3, every 6 counts as two hits)
-Fleshborer (weapon: 10m range, Damage 5, roll another 5 dice of damage the next turn)
-Devourer (weapon: 5m range, Damage 3, fire twice as one Primary action)
-Venom Cannon (weapon: 30m range, Damage 9, Cooldown 1)
-Toxin Sacs (Medicine to develop it for any given species of target. Threshold 2, each net hit grants 1 die of extra damage the turn after you strike in HtH)
-Regeneration (Threshold 3 Survival every turn. Every net hit restores 1 health box)
-Spores (Threshold 3 Endurance as a primary action. If it succeeds, take 1 level of damage, but create a spore mine under your control)
-Toxic Miasma (the Threshold to hit you in HtH increases by 1. If someone spends an entire round in HtH with you, they must make an Endurance check (Threshold equals your Strength) or lose one action on the following round)
-Anaphylaxis (anyone affected by your acid, poisoned attacks or toxic miasma will take another 5 dice of damage every round for one minute. Only Strength can be rolled to soak this.)
-Burrowing (you gain a 5m burrow speed, taking it again increases this by 3m each time)*
-Web Strangler (weapon: 30m range, 5m blast, Strength 5 and injured targets are Entangled 3)
-Tusks/Horns (whenever you charge, treat your Strength as 2 higher)
-Massive (size-related benefits/drawbacks, can transport others, gain special Massive Soak)
-Bio Cannon (Massive required. Weapon: Strength*2m range, Damage = Strength+3, ignores armour)
-Gullet (Massive required. You can carry other nids within your mouth/whatever)
-Soaring (Massive and Wings required: you can fly really long distances, very fast)

*Massive Soak: all weapons roll their Damage instead of automatic

-Shadow In The Warp (non-tyranid Psykers within 10m see the Threshold of their powers increased by 3)*
-Psychic Scream (all non-tyranids within 20m of you have the Threshold of all Morale checks increased by 1)*
-The Horror (anyone attempting to charge you must make a Morale check (Threshold equals your Will), otherwise their action fails and they become Afraid (rating 2))
-Catalyst (activates whenever you are at a -3 penalty or worse. You ignore wound penalties at this stage, can act when unconscious and can gain a full round of actions when killed - though you then die, no regeneration)
-Telepathy (you can communicate telepathically with other tyranids within 100m)
-Warp Field (+3 Soak Value (roll this))*
-Warp Blast (weapon: 20m range, Damage = Willpower, Threshold 3 Warp Sense to hit, ignores armour)

For equipment, you probably don't have much - humans and half-genestealers being the exception, and they can have basically whatever seems reasonable for the character.

[sciurindae]

why not some sneaky and/or seductive perks?

like pheromones, shapeshifting/fleshmask, mindclouding or knock-out venom, or cuttle-fish like skin for camo and the like? ^^

To help with the whole: "infiltration, seduction/rape, taking security down, influencing politics and going beneath the notice of the Ordo Xenos." :P

How will pyskers and transformation be handled? in the latter would it just be a redistribution of points? :)

[Creeper]

Probably won't be able to join this one actually due to life stuff. Sorry Kong  :-[

[magnamos]

I'm totally interested in this. A shame that I found out that late about it. I got another Idea for the setting and some rant if someone is interested.

Regarding the setting: Why play REAL Tyranides when the option is already given? We could play on a planet AFTER a Tyranide attack was countered by the Marines. They're on there way to another battle with there clan fortress and only some secondary Imperial troops are left behind. Now the spores become active and we, the poor citiciens start to mutate into Tyranides (We will end up as some sort of Genstealer anyway >_>). We could also mix and match. Some can play higher Tyranides and some are just recently mutated out of humans or something.

Now to the rant: Does this have to be a system game? Systemgames hate me! I always mess up with this rolling stuff. Can't we just use common sense to fight? ^_^;

[kongming]

Creeper: damn you a thousand-fold! Nah, I totally understand.

Magnamos: It's not that late, welcome aboard! Anyway, that is a possible idea for the starting point, though I'd rather give people the chance to start off as tyranids. Now, as for system rant, I'd really like to put my foot down on that. I feel that you can't have systemless combat - part of it is the chance of "I hit you!" "Nuh-uh!", part is the fact that, without randomness and rules, you know the players are always going to succeed without real casualties, and part is that it just feels more dull to me - maybe because I already know the outcome for certain.

However, I could handle the dice rolling for you if you want.

Sciurindae: Psyker powers are either just "you can use them whenever" powers (as a lot of Tyranid stuff doesn't even need a psychic test or "make a test to use it, there's a chance that bad shit will happen, but PCs are important enough that just rolling a pair of 6es won't make their head explode". And you can just buy new ones as you go along. As for transformation, yeah, you can basically redistribute your points at a later stage.

And yes, there are other perks - I'm all for people suggesting new ones.

Scent-trail: you can leave a trail that lingers for up to 24 hours, allowing others of your kind to locate you (and the places you've been). You can even leave a very simple message in the form of a feeling - "Safety", "Danger", "Curious", "Food" etc.

Distracting pheromones: Any non-tyranid within 5m of you slowly has their mind taken away by a barely perceptible scent you leave behind. The Threshold of all non-combat checks increases by 2 for them.

Lust pheromones: Any non-tyranid within 5m of you must make a Morale check (Threshold equals 2 plus 1/3 of your own Willpower) if you spend one minute letting this pheromone spread. If they fail, they become filled with Lust with a rating equal to the amount they failed by. Before the full minute, a Perception check (same Threshold) will notice something is up. An Empathy check (Threshold 2) can tell that someone is being affected by this and is not just lustful.

Psychic Haze: Roll Deception (+5 dice) opposed by the target's Warp Sense. If you succeed, then for one round they forget you exist (if you hide/flee on your next turn, then this lasts until they see you again). They will have difficulty recalling the encounter.

Camouflage: Your skin can blend in with nearby surroundings. If you are not moving, you gain +5 dice on Stealth checks and the Threshold to hit you in ranged combat goes up by 2. If you are moving, you still gain +2 dice on stealth checks and the Threshold to hit you in ranged combat goes up by 1.

Paralytic: You have a paralytic venom attached to one of your natural attacks or a syringe-like stinger. If the former, then any time it hits a foe and successfully deals damage, they must make an Endurance check (Threshold equals half your Strength, plus 1). If the latter, then any time you grapple a foe you can administer the venom and they must make the same check. If they fail, they count as Entangled with a rating equal to the number they failed by. If they fail another check before this wears off, they count as Stunned with a rating equal to the number they fail by. If they fail yet again, they become fully Paralysed.

Psychic Invisibility: With a Threshold 2 Warp Sense check, you can become completely invisible. This grants 3 automatic hits on all Stealth checks to not be seen.

Psychic Levitation: You can hover up to 3m above the ground as though you had a form of jetpack.

Veil: With a Threshold 3 Deception check, you can cloud the mind of one victim so that, for the encounter, they believe you are an ordinary member of their own race. This allows you to communicate with them, usually.

[magnamos]

I would be very greatefull if you could do the dice juggling for me. I'm not very talented with systems. It took me half of my evolution to learn Shadowrun and I only know the basics there.

[sciurindae]

Sounds good :) so where do we post our sheets and such?

[kongming]

I'd like if character sheets could be posted here for now - once everything is sorted we can put them in their own thread or something.